The Uni Watch Holiday Gift Guide

You’ve got sports fans. We’ve got the obscure team-specific gifts that’ll make ’em swoon.

December 4, 2019 8:42 am
uni watch holiday gift guide 2019
You can do better than jerseys and baseball caps this year
Stadium Map Art

For the past two decades, Paul Lukas been writing about sports uniforms, logos and field designs via Uni Watch, a column that has appeared on ESPN.com and Sports Illustrated as well as its own dedicated daily blog. Now he’s bringing his obsession — the aesthetics of athletics — to InsideHook.


Welcome to the annual Uni Watch Holiday Gift Guide, your best source for cool, memorable sports-themed gift items. Our ground rules are simple: You won’t find standard-issue jerseys and caps (you already know where to find those), but if you’re looking for unusual products relating to uniforms, team logos and other areas of athletics aesthetics, you’ve come to the right place.

As usual, your friendly uniform columnist has tried to compile items from a variety of different sports at a wide range of price points, so there should be something for everyone on your shopping list (or just for yourself).

Ready? Here we go.

1. Laser-Engraved Stadium Maps

stadium map art
Image via Stadium Map Art

Woodworker Zach Holt and his dad use satellite imagery and an engraving machine to create spectacular wooden maps, complete with 3D stadium models. You can get a close-up street view of the city neighborhood showing your favorite stadium, or a state map showing the stadium’s location. Either way, the results are fantastic. See for yourself at StadiumMapArt.com.

2. The Sports Shoe: A History from Field to Fashion

sports shoe history from field to fashion
Image via Paul Lukas

If there’s a sneakerhead on your shopping list, they’ll love this book from British author Thomas Turner, which traces the history of athletic footwear from its 19th-century UK lawn tennis origins to modern sneaker culture. Packed with interesting info and excellent graphics from vintage ads and catalogs, the book shows how sports shoes began as functional gear for specific athletic activities and have been transformed into lifestyle totems. It’s available here.

3. Team Logo String Art

Remember string art? Crafter Nicole DiFrank, operating under the name Things Made by Strings, rescues this technique from 1970s summer camp kitsch and uses it to create super-cool renderings of sports team logos. (You can see more of her work here.) Each piece is unique, and she happily takes special requests. You can contact her via Etsy, Facebook or Instagram.

4. Defunct Hockey Team Apparel

Image via VintageIceHockey.com

Do you remember the Albany Choppers, the Ottawa Civics or the Birmingham South Stars? Right, me neither. But while those old hockey teams may not exist anymore, they left behind some great logos and graphics, and the website VintageIceHockey.com is devoted to preserving those designs on T-shirts, hoodies and coffee mugs. Lots of great stuff — check it out here.

5. Sports Stadium and Arena Scratch-Off Posters

Image via Pop Chart

The folks at Pop Chart have been making great infographic posters for years now, but lately they’ve upped their game by producing a series of posters that show diagrams of pro sports stadiums and arenas that you can then scratch off to reveal the corresponding field, court, or ice rink designs. It’s the one scratch-off game where everybody wins. The posters are available for MLB ballparks, NFL stadiums, NBA arenas and NHL arenas, plus there’s a discounted set of all four.

6. Sports Mascot 3D Puzzles

Image via FOCO

The innovative collectibles company FOCO makes a series of three-dimensional puzzles featuring a wide range of pro and college sports mascots. If mascots aren’t your thing, they have similar puzzles for stadiums and football helmets. Fun stuff for kids and adults alike.

7. Uniform Books for Kids

Image via Lovable Duck Sketchbooks

With uniforms, as with so many other things, you’ve got to start ’em young. So if there’s a budding uni-watcher on your shopping list, hook them up with these uni-centric coloring books and let their design imaginations run wild. You have your choice of Make Your Own Football Player and Make Your Own Soccer Player. (And while you’re at it, you could do a lot worse than to add That’s My Team!: The History, Science, and Fun Behind Sports Teams’ Names to their stockings.)

8. Hockey Card Collages

Image via Aaron Stilley

Artist Aaron Stilley cuts up hockey trading cards and uses them to create very cool hockey-themed collages, each of which is a one-of-a-kind original. You can see what he currently has available, and also contact him with special requests, at his Etsy shop.

9. Cleveland Browns 1946 Wool Throwback Jersey

Image via Ebbets Field Flannels

We don’t usually feature standard licensed jerseys here in the Uni Watch Gift Guide, but it’s worth making an exception for this magnificent Browns throwback from Ebbets Field Flannels (part of a line of similarly wonderful NFL retro stylings). The wool fabric, the sleeve stripes, the block-shadowed numerals — so good! The only downer is that these jerseys are made to order and take six to eight weeks to ship, so they won’t arrive in time for the holidays, but some things are worth the wait. Full details here.

10. Commemorative Sports Moment Cartoons

Image via Rob Ullman

Is there a special sports moment that resonates for you, like when you favorite team finally won its first championship, or when your favorite player gave a clutch performance? Cartoonist Rob Ullman will depict that moment for you in a custom-drawn illustration. Turnaround time is about a month, so your artwork may not be ready in time for the holidays, but Rob should be able to provide you with a preliminary drawing to use as a placeholder until the finished piece is ready. Get the full scoop here.

Honorable Mentions and Old Favorites

That should be enough to help cross off a lot of the names on your gift list. But if you want to shop a little more, we also have Uni Watch merchandise for your consideration.

Paul Lukas has been writing about uniforms for over 20 years. If you like this article, you’ll probably like his Uni Watch Blog, plus you can follow him on Twitter and Facebook. Want to learn about his Uni Watch Membership Program, check out his Uni Watch merchandise, or just ask him a question? Contact him here.

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